1w ago

How do you manage private phones with work necessities?

I’ve been tinkering with the idea of switching back to a dumb phone. I haven’t dug too far into the search because every time I do, I get hung up on the apps I need for work - outlook, my work keycard app, etc. Is there any good way to work around this? Keep my current phone with only those apps for work, operating on WiFi, and switch my primary phone? If anyone has examples of things they’ve tried and what’s worked, that would be great. TIA!

15 comments

I have a separate, company-issued phone that is used exclusively for work related activities and that is not even connected to my home network.
- Same here. I use the shelter to keep a couple of personal apps seperated on the work phone. For good measure, I keep company electronics in a Faraday pouch after hours.
- This is the correct answer. If they want you to do any work in a mobile, remote, out of hours capacity, they need to provide the device.
  I used to help manage MDM at my old company and I can tell you there is a shit load they can do once you install their utilities. For example:
  remotely wipe your phone
  block your ability to copy/paste between applications
  view all web traffic to/from it (even encrypted traffic since we installed a proxy that put its own trusted root certificate in)
  
  Yeah, as far as I am concerned, there's a direct conflict of interest between myself and my company when it comes the usage of a device that doubles as a personal and professional device. I understand the company's need to take measures to control sensitive information, and when I do whatever I do on my spare time, I am unnecessarily (from the point of view of the company) endangering the information I have access to. And because of the safe-guards they put in place, they are taking an unacceptable amount of control of a device I keep my personal sensitive data.
  Because of this I find it a bit baffling that BYOD ever became accepted practice, both from the employer's side and the employee's side.
I agree with @Libb@piefed.social. I would not mix the two at all. If they want me to have a phone with their apps on it, they can provide me one.
Also, for your privacy, it may not be actually the best idea to switch back to a dumb phone, because then you are limited to SMS, which is not secure, and phone calls, which are not secure.
On a smartphone you have things like signal.
If work wants me checking email on the go then they can supply the phone. I don’t have an email app on my personal phone.
I use Shelter to activate the work profile.
Then all the work related apps are installed there.
It can have an activation schedule or activated or disabled manually and conveniently with on board Android functions.
It's different in my own situation (I don't have a boss) but would I be employed I would not mix work and personal. Ever. Phone, friendship, or whatever else as there is a too high probability some shit will happen.
I would have my own phone and next to it the job would provide me another one with whatever shitty apps they require me to use, if they rely want me to use it. And I would turn that bastard off the moment my work day is finished (aka the moment they stop giving me money in exchange of my time).
Exactly like I would not use my own computer for work. It's mine.
I have a second cheap second hand phone for work only purposes.
My employer has their device attestation set to only allow intune / Microsoft products to sign in if you are running stock android. Graphene nogo.
Get whatever phone you want privately. If your work depends on you having a smartphone for various things, they can provide you with one. I have never used my work phone privately, and never will. I just have two phones, one of them gets turned off when I leave the office.
Use Shelter to create a work profile. This keeps all your work stuff sandboxed from your private account (or non-account).
I have a smartphone and a small dumbphone - one for work stuff and one for play. I have glued velcro to the backs of them, so they can be like one phone in my pocket. Ultimate flexibility.

15 comments